In a few days he came to me in a most deplorable physical
condition. He was a mere wreck of his former
self. Almost immediately he began to talk about
the attempt to abduct the boy from Oxford; how innocent
he was in the matter, and how terribly he had suffered
merely because he happened to be with me when I rashly
endeavored to kidnap the lad. All this went through
me like a sharp sword. It seemed as if I was
the cause, not only of great unhappiness to myself,
but of pain and misery to all who were associated or
brought in contact with me. For this poor boy,
who had endured and suffered so much on my account,
I could not do enough. My means and time must
now be devoted to his recovery, if recovery, was possible.

He was weak, but was still able to walk about, and
he enjoyed riding very much. I kept him with
me in the city a week or two, taking daily rides to
the Park and into the country, and when he felt like
going out in the evening I made him go to some place
of amusement with me. I had no other business,
and meant to have none, but to take care of Henry,
and I devoted myself wholly to his comfort and happiness.
In a few days he had much improved in health and spirits,
so much so, that I meditated making a long tour with
him to the South, hoping that the journey there and
back again would fully restore him.

Fortunately, my recent Maine business had put me in
possession of abundant funds, and when I had matured
my scheme, and saw that Henry was in tolerable condition
to travel, I proposed the trip to him, and he joyfully
assented to my plan. I wanted to get him far away,
for awhile, from a part of the country which was associated
in his mind, more than in mine, with so much misery,
and he seemed quite as eager to go. Change of
air and scene I knew would do wonders for him bodily,
and would build him up again.

We made our preparations and started for the South,
going first to Baltimore and then on through the Southern
States by railroad to New Orleans. It was late
in the fall of 1860, just before the rebellion, when
the south was seceding or talking secession, and was
already preparing for war. Henry’s physical
condition compelled us to rest frequently on the way,
and we stopped sometimes for two or three days at
a time, at nearly every large town or city on the entire
route. Everywhere there was a great deal of excitement;
meetings were held nearly every night secession was
at fever heat, and there was an unbounded expression
and manifestation of ill-feeling against the north
and against northern men. Nevertheless, I was
never in any part of the Union where I was treated
with so much courtesy, consideration and genuine kindness
as I was there and then. I was going south, simply
to benefit the invalid who accompanied me; everybody
seemed to know it; and everybody expressed the tenderest
sympathy for my son. Wherever we stopped, it seemed
as if the people at the hotels, from the landlord
to the lowest servant, could not do enough for us.